So, the only time so far I have seen LotR played with two balls was during a flip frenzy, where it was one of fifteen machines.

Looking at the section you quoted, that’s in the change log. I can’t find where in the rules themselves this is mentioned. Can you help out? I’m trying to figure out whether this would apply to a flip frenzy. Regardless of the answer, I suspect it would make only a tiny fraction of a point difference?

It’s possible during a flip frenzy to have the game “finished” after one ball, if one player concedes. Sometimes, that is strategically the right thing to do. For example, if my opponent comes first and puts up a monster score, I can concede if I decide that running him/her down would take too long (assuming that I actually manage to do that). It often is better to get away from a machine quickly with a loss, than to spend a long time grinding out a win. But there is no “goal” that could be achieved in a single ball. It’s simply two-person match play on each machine.

Most brutal game I’ve ever seen was WOF at MPE. Sensitive tilt, ALL outlane posts removed and half the center posts removed and no ball save. Almost ALL the shots on a ramp would moon walk and drain – including missed skill shot plunges. If I remember correctly, I was around 10th in qualifying with 3 skill shots and no flips.

Makes me wonder what the most brutally set up game I’ve played was. EM house games aside, that junkyard from Louisville made me sick to my stomach to play, though others had success on it. X-men at the prior Louisville was difficult, and the Indy500. At PAPA I felt like an infant trying to play that monster bash in qualifying a few years back, and AFM last year. Avatar at PPO, RCT at pinburgh. All these stand out to me as games I’ve normally had success on but in these setups I couldn’t get a hold of them. Having said that, I know most of them needed to be set up more difficult because of the caliber of players, former, etc. keep games difficult because it makes it more interesting and memorable

Surely as long as the same for everyone the best players will cope? And those not good enough still aren’t good enough (and I can say that not being good enough lol) Although my pet hates are over sensitive tilts unless you get a chance to practise or the sensitivity is consistent in the bank of machines and also scoops that dribble the ball out in a way that you’d never expect. The TAF at TPF caught a lot of folks out in this regard.

The pingolf rules. I guess since in this case the game is two ball due to a long playing game and you’re not trying to achieve a score or objective as quickly as possible, but makes sense to me that if you don’t play at least three balls that doesn’t count as a full game.

If one ball games counted full value, can’t TDs just change formats to one ball games and get 100% TGP all the time?

Makes sense to you, yeah. I can see your reasoning. I just don’t see anything in the rules explicitly supporting it.

I’d also argue that my that logic, if those two balls take longer than a three ball game on another machine, then shouldn’t it count for more, not less? Deciding that some games of pinball aren’t as valid competitionally is a very hairy route to go down in my opinion. In the end, two or more people competed on a game, and one was victorious.

“The TGP will now include games played that are fewer than 3 balls, including timed formats where players are attempting to reach a score or objective as quickly as possible. Any game where it’s possible for the player to finish on the first ball in play, will be calculated at 33% value for TGP purposes.”

Any games set to 1 ball = 33% value, any games set to 2 ball = 66% value . . . any games set to timed/points goals that CAN be reached in 1 ball = 33% value.

With respect to conceding a match, that’s perfectly acceptable and doesn’t discount the TGP of that game played.

However, there is a wrinkle here that is not acceptable to us, and that’s conceding multiple matches by multiple players to ‘fast forward’ through a tournament format, and trying to capture all of those “games played” towards TGP.

Best example of a tournament is a 4-strike event with 28 players. The event gets down to two players who each have 0 strikes. Rather than playing potentially 7 more games, both players agree to forfeit 3 losses each and make their next game the ‘last game’ for the night.

We would definitely frown upon any event that tried to claim they ran a 4-strike tournament with 28 players and use the TGP guide that captures all those rounds that were believed to have been played.

So there’s an unworded implication that we’re supposed to apply that to 2 ball as well? But 4+ ball don’t count extra even though the same logic would apply?

Perhaps I was naive in assuming people were aware that 5 ball games have never been worth and aren’t currently worth +1.66 TGP per game played. I would have guessed that this would have been brought up by TD’s who run a ton of Classics events as this would surely have been THE EXPLOIT to capitalize on.

It’s now clear that we need to be more clear . . . updated verbiage is below:

“The TGP will now include games played that are fewer than 3 balls, including timed formats where players are attempting to reach a score or objective as quickly as possible. Any game where it’s possible for the player to finish on the first ball in play, will be calculated at 33% value for TGP purposes. Any games set to 1-ball play will be worth 33% value. Any games set to 2-ball play will be worth 66% value. No games beyond 3 balls will be worth anything above 100% for TGP purposes. For example, if players have a goal of reaching a certain feature in a game as a way of winning that game or match, the fact that it is POSSIBLE for the player to reach that objective on ball 1 means this will count as 1/3rd of a game played towards TGP. The exception to this rule will be the Pin-Golf format, which will have it’s own set of grading rules (see next bullet points).”